After Midnight Hours
by adonais
Summary: Lily catches Sirius out of bed after hours. A little friendly fluff. One shot.


**Author's Note**: This is one of many one-shots born on a night (or was it morning?) of little sleep, many cups of tea and some amazing inspiration from my close friend The Second Coming. She provided the prompt for this, being: "Lily catches Sirius out of bed late at night." Needless to say, it got the creative juices flowing and here I am with this completed morsel. Enjoy!

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**After Midnight Hours**

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"Mooooooooony!" Sirius grumbled, shaking his friend, who was sleeping soundly in the four-poster bed next to his. "Mooooony! Wake up!" He hissed urgently.

"Wh-what?" Remus awoke, only to be shaken fully awake by a rather distraught Sirius. "What's going on? Is everything all right?" He rubbed his eyes. James' snoring could be heard from the room beside theirs. That was a good sign.

"No! I just...oh I just...oh nevermind." Sirius then proceeded to sit down on the carpeted floor with a thunk. Remus considered joining him, as his friend looked rather drawn. But there was a History final at eight in the morning and Remus had stayed up late studying for it. This was all subtracting the fact that he was due for a full moon in two days and was not feeling like himself.

"Fine." Remus covered his head with the blankets and then said, with a pillow to muffle his words, "Go back to bed, shrimpface."

Sirius straightened and then rolled his eyes. James had dubbed him "shrimpface" earlier that day when he fell asleep in McGonagall's class. She had turned his pincushion (which he had previously turned into a pin that was squishy) into a shrimp, which had crawled into his robes and caused him some discomfort for a while afterwards.

"I will. Need a glass of water." Sirius pulled himself back up, using Remus' bedpost for support. His friend grunted and soon fell into slumber again as Sirius slipped down the stairs and into the Gryffindor Common Room. There, he found the glass of water with lemon that he had been looking for. He considered Transfiguring it to Firewhisky, but changed his mind, thinking of the last time he tried it (he had a sore throat for two weeks, not to mention other unforeseen consequences involving one closet and a flowerpot).

He considered returning to bed after the drink, but turned around as he reached the stairs. Perhaps a late night walk would do him some good. He did that a lot as of late, sometimes with Remus and sometimes alone, when his friend was not in the mood. Often, he managed to think of borrowing James' invisibility cloak, but tonight, it completely slipped his mind. He left through the Fat Lady's portrait, not without waking her from her excellent dream in Sugar Quill Paradise.

Sirius wandered rather aimlessly, not daring to light his wand for fear of attracting a professor (who was likely patrolling nearby). But even if that were the case, he had been caught so often that he was just sent back to the Gryffindor Common Room and given a stern ten minute lecture on school rules. He knew the speech by heart already.

"Just what do you think you are doing here?!" Lily Evans stepped out from within a stall. Stall? Only then did Sirius realize that he had walked right into the ladies's bathroom on the third floor. "Sirius?" She raised an eyebrow in the dim light, provided by her wand.

"Goin' for a stroll, as it were." He tried very hard not to look perverted.

"In the ladies' room?" Lily sounded unconvinced. "Besides, what are you doing up in the first place?"

"I could ask the same of you." He said rather smoothly, one hand casually scratching his chin, and then ruining the moment when he yawned something spectacular.

"History test. Heard it's going to be killer." Lily gestured at a textbook and a stack of notes, which were sitting on the toilet seat cover. Sirius stared.

"The Common Room is a nice place to study. And it's pretty quiet in there at this hour." Sirius said, sounding unconvinced, and made his way to the sink. He put his hand on the tap, when Lily stopped him.

"Don't do that, someone will hear. And I can't stand disturbances when I study, so I don't work in the Common Room." She shot him a look that reminded him that he was indeed in female territory and should leave as soon as he could without damaging his ego.

"Well, I'd suggest you go back anyway. The light can't be good for your eyes." He said as carelessly as he could, before turning around and heading out the door and into Professor McGonagall.

"Ah, Mr. Black. Late night excursion again?"

"Yes, ma'am."

"Well, let's have it."

"Have what, Professor?"

"I know you and your little friends like to cavort in the most unusual places. Call out your friends and we'll all have a talk back in the Common Room." McGonagall's lips were terribly thin at this point. He thought she might have accidentally eaten them. "Hurry up, Mr. Black, we don't have all night."

Sirius paused for a moment, still trying not to laugh, and then said, "There's no one else here with me."

"Don't be ridiculous, I just heard you speaking to someone."

"I talk to myself at night." He cracked a smile and bit his lip, trying not to look embarrassed, which he actually was, since he knew Lily could hear all of this.

Soon after, McGonagall escorted both of them back to the Common Room and Sirius caught Lily's grateful look before he turned to the stairs up to the boy's dorms.


End file.
